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Idea Debt

jessicaabel.com

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Re: Idea Debt

#121

Post by xrange »

junto wrote: post #75
xhrpost wrote: post #52

This, this is probably the biggest and yet least recognized obstruction for wannapreneurs. I know because I've been there myself for years and have only recently realized what I was doing. I would get really excited about an idea, start working on it, only work on the interesting parts (not on what actually had to come next) and then let it fizzle away as the next wave of emotion came with another idea. I would justi…

I don't know if this is just me, but I used to be full of ideas, half finished projects and several projects that I talked myself out of. Since having children, I no longer have ideas, and rarely work on anything than paid contract work. Has anyone else experienced this? I feel void of ideas.

Could testosterone be a factor?

http://healthland.time.com/2011/09/13/why-do-dads-have-lower...

Re: Idea Debt

#122

Post by wellpast »

hellofunk wrote: post #25

Steven King has said something that I've come to support, that note/list-keeping is a great way to let bad ideas survive. He claims that a really good idea will survive in your head on its own, and a bad idea will die. And that by writing down every idea, you are polluting your landscape of possibilities by immortalizing ideas that are better left forgotten.

I like this! Do you have a reference?

Re: Idea Debt

#123

Post by xrange »

xhrpost wrote: post #97
kilroy123 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I too have done this for years! I'm still not a damn entrepreneur and make no money aside from my day job. I think I finally realized what I have to do to get off this vicious cycle. Build a habit of working everyday on one project. It's cool to get excited about a new project, but unless I change my daily routine to fit in time to work on said project, nothing will ever get created. Successful companies and projects…

You're on your way! Consider looking up Stanford Professor Tina Seelig, she's the only researcher I know of that remotely talks about this. Check out some of her talks and blog posts.

She has written a few books:

http://www.amazon.com/Tina-Seelig/e/B00MAPL7P0

...and has a blog:

http://creativityrulz.blogspot.com/

...and here are some video lectures:

http://ecorner.stanford.edu/search;jsessionid=833B2D89C66AC2...

...any recommendations on the books?

Re: Idea Debt

#124

Post by blablablame »

junto wrote: post #75
xhrpost wrote: post #52

This, this is probably the biggest and yet least recognized obstruction for wannapreneurs. I know because I've been there myself for years and have only recently realized what I was doing. I would get really excited about an idea, start working on it, only work on the interesting parts (not on what actually had to come next) and then let it fizzle away as the next wave of emotion came with another idea. I would justi…

I don't know if this is just me, but I used to be full of ideas, half finished projects and several projects that I talked myself out of. Since having children, I no longer have ideas, and rarely work on anything than paid contract work. Has anyone else experienced this? I feel void of ideas.

I don't think it is a void of ideas, but more of a way of your brain saying this isn't worth it so lets forget about it.

Since my kid was born, every idea I have goes through a process of 'will it make money'->'how much'->'how long will it take'->'what is the actual $ amount per hour it requires' and if it falls lower than a very big number, I just ignore (and usually racionalize it as not worth it) and go play with my kid.

Re: Idea Debt

#125

Post by shostack »

elcapitan wrote: post #6

The concept is probably related to something you could call 'recursive idea debt' or 'recursive learning debt' in tech - when you come up with an exciting idea, and because you have no constraints you start thinking about this great new technology you would learn for that project and use. And then you would find 3 other interesting technologies or concepts related to that which you would want to learn more about. And…

Definitely been hit with this. On the flip side, I usually learn something new and useful out of it.

I'm an "early" programmer, so there's a ton I don't know. When I start breaking an idea I get to things like "oh, how do I have this running in the background while the user is still doing something?" That got me into Rails background workers, the Sidekiq and Foreman gems, etc. All were super useful for me to know about, and concepts that I knew existed in a vague sense, but hadn't actually gotten to yet.

That said, these totally take me down a rabbit hole, and are ultimately counterproductive towards the core idea if they are distracting enough.

Re: Idea Debt

#126

Post by stuartaxelowen »

MasterScrat wrote: post #40
danieltillett wrote: post #10

I love my idea debt. Not only are they a connection to my younger self, but old ideas are a rich ore to be mined for new ideas. Some of my best current ideas are old ideas that have been tweaked by experience or external change so they are now relevant. Keep working on your ideas, but make sure you are actually turning some of them into reality.

> Some of my best current ideas are old ideas that have been tweaked by experience or external change so they are now relevant. I can't find the reference right now but it reminds me from a scheme from Feynman. He would keep a few ideas he's very familiar with in mind. Then every time he would be exposed to a new concept, he would consider each of his "core" ideas in light of this new concept.

Yes! He was building a single model to describe reality.

Re: Idea Debt

#127

Post by runewell »

Sadly, I have been a vicitm of idea debt. As a young developer I had a grande vision of starting an online network of websites. I spent a solid month planning them all out, designing the logos and everything. Needless to say, when I showed the work to my boss he was less than impressed that I put off client work to plan our company's world domination.

I still have all the logos :) https://www.dropbox.com/s/7uxj41grx7s79mg/all-logos.jpg?dl=0

Re: Idea Debt

#128

Post by arthur_pryor »

junto wrote: post #75
xhrpost wrote: post #52

This, this is probably the biggest and yet least recognized obstruction for wannapreneurs. I know because I've been there myself for years and have only recently realized what I was doing. I would get really excited about an idea, start working on it, only work on the interesting parts (not on what actually had to come next) and then let it fizzle away as the next wave of emotion came with another idea. I would justi…

I don't know if this is just me, but I used to be full of ideas, half finished projects and several projects that I talked myself out of. Since having children, I no longer have ideas, and rarely work on anything than paid contract work. Has anyone else experienced this? I feel void of ideas.

i don't have kids, and so have no first hand knowledge here. most of my second-hand anecdotal experience is that people have kids, and they often still have ideas, but no time to really implement them.

i did have one coworker at my old job who said that the limited free time he got once he had kids motivated him to be more productive, and actually made him better at getting side projects done. probably the exception, and he was a pretty motivated and focused guy anyway, as far as i could tell.

Re: Idea Debt

#129

Post by andrewflnr »

benjaminjosephw wrote: post #7

> "If… you have 'binders of lore' and no book... you’re living with serious Idea Debt." Moving from a daydream to some actual artefacts the first step _away_ from Idea Debt, not further into it. In technical terms, this could be writing a script instead of building an application or creating a spec and some documentation before writing some code. I'd argue that this is where you start to flesh-out and make real your…

Building "binders of lore", while usually important, is actually much easier than actually writing the final product, and it's really not analogous to a spec (that would be your detailed outline). Background material is fun and feels productive, but can easily lead you around your goal rather than toward it. Maybe you operate differently, but as someone with a tendency to build worlds rather than plots, that part made perfect sense to me.
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